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Icarus
'' (ca. 1558) by Pieter Bruegel the Elder]] In Greek mythology, Icarus (the Latin spelling, conventionally adopted in English; Greek: , Íkaros, Etruscan: Vikare''Larissa Bonfante, Judith Swaddling, ''Etruscan Myths, p. 43) is the son of the master craftsman Daedalus. The main story told about Icarus is his attempt to escape from Crete by means of wings constructed by his father. He ignored instructions not to fly too close to the sun, and fell to his death. The myth shares thematic similarities with that of Phaëton, and is often depicted in art. Escape from Crete Icarus' father, Daedalus, a talented and remarkable Athenian craftsman/engineer, attempted to escape from his exile in the place of Crete, where he and his son were imprisoned at the hands of King Minos, the king for whom he had built the Labyrinth to imprison the Minotaur (half man, half bull). Daedalus, the superior craftsman, was exiled because he gave Minos' daughter, Ariadne, a clewclew – a ball of yarn or thread. The etymology of the word "clue" is a direct reference to this story of the Labyrinth. in order to help Theseus, the enemy of Minos, survive the Labyrinth and defeat the Minotaur. Daedalus fashioned two pairs of wings out of wax and feathers for himself and his son. Before they took off from the island, Daedalus warned his son not to fly too close to the sun, nor too close to the sea. Overcome by the giddiness that flying lent him, Icarus soared through the sky curiously, but in the process he came too close to the sun, which melted the wax. Icarus kept flapping his wings but soon realized that he had no feathers left and that he was only flapping his bare arms. And so, Icarus fell into the sea in the area which bears his name, the Icarian Sea near Icaria, an island southwest of Samos. Hellenistic writers give euhemeristic variants in which the escape from Crete was actually by boat, provided by Pasiphaë, for which Daedalus invented the first sails, to outstrip Minos' pursuing galleys, and that Icarus fell overboard en route to Sicily and drowned. Heracles erected a tomb for him. Category:Greek mythology Category:Deaths from falls Category:Accidental deaths from falls References in classical literature Icarus' flight was often alluded to by Greek poets in passing, but was related briefly in Pseudo-Apollodorus.[[Bibliotheke|Epitome of the Biblioteca]] i.11 and ii.6.3. In the literature of ancient Rome, the myth was of interest to Augustan writers. Hyginus narrates it in his Fabula 40, beginning with the bovine love affair of Pasiphaë, daughter of the Sun, resulting in the birth of the Minotaur. Ovid narrates the story of Icarus at some length in the Metamorphoses (viii.183–235), and refers to it elsewhere; his implicitly comparative treatment of the myths of Icarus and PhaethonGareth D. Williams, Banished voices: readings in Ovid's Exile Poetry (Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 132 online. influenced the mythological tradition in English-language literaturePeter Knox, A Companion to Ovid (Blackwell, 2009), p. 424 online. as received and interpreted by major writers such as Chaucer,Jane Chance, The Mythographic Chaucer (University of Michigan Press, 1995), p. 65 online. Marlowe,Troni Y. Grande, Marlovian Tragedy (Associated University Presses, 1990), pp. 14 online, 40–42 et passim; Frederic B. Tromly, Playing with Desire: Christopher Marlowe and the Art of Tantalization (University of Toronto Press, 1998), p. 181. Shakespeare,Coppélia Kahn, Man's estate: Masculine Identity in Shakespeare (University of California Press, 1981), p. 53 online. Milton,Su Fang Nu, Literature and the Politics of Family in Seventeenth-Century England (Cambridge University Press, 2007), p. 154 online; R.J. Zwi Werblowsky, Lucifer and Prometheus (Routledge, 2001, reprinted from 1952), p. 32 online. and Joyce.R.J. Schork, Latin and Roman Culture in Joyce (University Press of Florida, 1997), p. 160 online. References in modern work ;Literature *Stephen Dedalus is the Icarian antihero in James Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. * Icarus Allsorts is a satirical poem written by Roger McGough during the height of the Cold War. *In the book Airman by Eoin Colfer, Conor (Finn) tries to escape Little Saltee (a prison) by flight, and makes some reference to Icarus as he is flying with an illusion of "riding the moon". *Used as a reference in William Carlos Williams' "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" and W. H. Auden's "Musée des Beaux-Arts." These poems refer respectively to the name and location of the painting by Pieter Brueghel the Elder. *Used as a reference in the poem "To a Friend Whose Work Has Come to Triumph" by Anne Sexton. *Used as a reference in the poem "Mrs Icarus" by Carol Ann Duffy. *Used as a reference in the poem "Icarus Burning" by Hiromi Yoshida. *Used as the name of the space ships that are commissioned to carry stellar bombs to our dying sun in Danny Boyle's Sunshine (2007 film). ;Modern music Notes ]] ]] References *Graves, Robert, (1955) 1960. The Greek Myths, section 92 passim *Smith, William, ed. A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology *Pinsent, J. (1982). Greek Mythology. New York: Peter Bedrick Books. See also *Bladud *Icaria *Jatayu External links *Daedalus and Icarus - English prose translation of Ovid'' *Spoof [[Civil Aviation Authority (United Kingdom)|CAA] Style Accident Report About Icarus Incident] Category:Greek mythology Category:Deaths from falls Category:Accidental deaths from falls af:Ikaros bn:ইকারোস br:Ikaros bg:Икар ca:Ícar cs:Íkaros cy:Icarus da:Ikaros de:Ikarus el:Ίκαρος es:Ícaro eo:Ikaro fa:ایکاروس fr:Icare ko:이카로스 hr:Ikar is:Íkaros it:Icaro he:איקארוס la:Icarus hu:Ikarosz mk:Икар mn:Икарус nl:Icarus ja:イーカロス no:Ikaros pl:Ikar pt:Ícaro ro:Icar ru:Икар simple:Icarus sl:Ikar (mitologija) sr:Икар fi:Ikaros sv:Ikaros th:อิคะเริส tr:İkarus uk:Ікар zh:伊卡洛斯